I went around shopping today - Cali-Mex, Tower Record, Army Surplus, and found this postcard. This shows one of the features of L.A. I drove down: Figueroa from Sunset to Olympic, traversing area in this picture.

Postcard back:

Millions of people driving millions of cars plus temperature invesion provides Los Angeles with a near perfect environment for the production and containment of photochemical smog. Auto emissions are 80% to 90% responsible for smog. Sunlight instigates a chemical reaction between nitrogen dioxide, a major component of automobile exhaust, and hydrocarbons, a product of evaporated gasoline. Temperature inversion exists when there is a layer of warm air at higher altitude - around 1500 ft. - instead of cololer air. The LA Basin Inversion acts as a giant lid over the smog, inhabitants and visitors.

Leonard's comments:

Somehow the back copy makes smog sound like a good thing. Not all the smog stays in the basin: a lot of it leaks over into the San Joaquin Valley, where we would move in a few years, creating health hazards there.

It's quite possible this is a snarky postcard created by a New Yorker who hates LA.

This document (source) is part of Crummy, the webspace of Leonard Richardson (contact information). It was last modified on Thursday, November 26 2015, 04:03:03 Nowhere Standard Time and last built on Sunday, February 18 2018, 04:00:19 Nowhere Standard Time.